Vancouver is in the middle of a green wall revolution. A record number of these environmentally friendly sustainable “living” walls – also called vertical gardens – are being built here at the moment.

One of the first ones went up a couple of years ago at the aquarium’s Aquawest Learning Centre. Measuring 3 metre by 15.2 metre (10 by 50 feet), it was filled with 7,000 plants, mostly native species of fern, bleedingheart, huckleberry and wintergreen.

The importance of landscape is neglected in the Government’s eco-towns plans, the Landscape Institute said this week.

Chair of the Landscape Institute Policy Committee Jon Lovell said eco-towns provided “an outstanding opportunity” but warned that the sustainability of the proposed eco-towns depended on the integration of landscape planning, design and management. He said that green space needed to be viewed as essential infrastructure – as equally as important as roads, services and other ‘grey’ infrastructure’ components.

Open to University of Auckland Civil and Environmental Engineering students, the competition brief was to re-design a system that reduces stormwater runoff and pollution in new housing developments, while contributing to good urban design.

The competition was jointly sponsored by the Auckland Regional Council, the Hobsonville Land Company – a subsidiary of Housing New Zealand Corporation – with support from The University of Auckland.

The proposed re-design area covered 25 hectares of land in north-west Auckland currently being developed by the Hobsonville Land Company, and was to “set new benchmarks for sustainable development” using a Low Impact Design (LID) approach.

The winning team were Alex Cheah, Jonathan Church and Andrew Hope. They received a prize of $1,500. Runners up were Jade Gibson, Rachel Kelly and Julia Wells, who received $1,000. The third place went to Nick Hohaia, Sam Reed and Leon West, who received $500.

Times Square is about to receive New York City’s first green-powered electronic billboard. Tokyo-based Ricoh Company, Ltd. will install a 47 by 126 foot sign on the Reuters Building (3 Times Square, at the northwestern corner of 42nd Street and 7th Avenue) that will draw power from 45 solar panels and 4 wind turbines. In what should be an interesting twist, if the photovoltaics do not receive sufficient sunlight or winds are not strong enough to drive the turbines, the sign will simply not illuminate. According to Ricoh, the installation should account for a reduction of 18 tons in carbon dioxide per year.

An all-star group of international architects bidding for the chance to design a new urban center for the South Korean capital said Tuesday the vast site offered a rare chance to create a model for 21st century cities.

Five top architecture firms behind many of the world’s recent iconic structures are being given US$1 million each to propose a master plan for the 28 trillion won (US$27 billion) Yongsan business district.